The State of the “Yeah, No”

I am sick of the affirmative negative.

Let me set the scene. I am standing. Somewhere. On both feet. On a corner. Someone is standing next to me. We are waiting for the little colorful handy-dandy red hand of freedom to tell us it’s okay to cross the street to the other side. There is an extremely unsanitary button affixed to the pole next to the person who is next to me, that if they press it, will alert the tiny nanobots inside the city’s traffic network that there are people who would like to see “the little colorful handy-dandy red hand” so that we may cross.

I turn to the person and I say: Have you pressed the button?

And they say: Yeah, no.

And talk like that is driving me crazy.